1912
_______
Abigail
Well, it finally happened. Oregon women finally earned the right to vote. I lived to see it! My brother Harvey did not. He was far away in Maryland when he passed three years ago, unexpectedly, but then is death ever expected? Even with an illness it comes as a shock. He needed emergency surgery, and it ended badly. He left his family well-off, his wife a millionaire, but she earned it having to live with him all those years. Oh, I should let it go now. I’ve had my life as rich as his, and we found a truce before the end, despite his editorials at each campaign urging defeat. And he had his own defeat when he ran for the Senate.
Oregon went through six suffrage campaigns before the vote arrived. Washington women got their say—again—in 1910. California beat us too, voting it in last fall. I suspect Harvey’s opposition had something to do with Oregon’s delay, and perhaps my own fractious ways contributed as well. Kate notes that. I can take criticism from her.
I have time now to write my autobiography. I’ve already begun, and the title will be Path Breaking: An Autobiographical History of the Equal Suffrage Movement in Oregon. I’ll write of the struggles but also the triumphs. We had them both, but that is what passion is about, is it not? The ups and downs, being in the thick of things and then wasting away at times in the thin of them. Women were appointed to public posts even before they could vote. Oregon had a female public health officer, and Lola Baldwin became the first woman detective in the entire nation. She served right here in Portland. Even a female market inspector happened before we had the vote, and why not? Who better than a woman to know about pork and health and, yes, enforcing the laws that we had no say in making but can recognize justice when it’s needed?
I’ll write too of my greatest achievement and greatest assets—my children. I love them so, and they are coming here for this big occasion. I wish Sarah Maria and Maggie had lived to see this day and Little Toot. And Ben. And Clara Belle, who sang at those suffrage meetings and gave me permission to continue on even while she breathed her last. Both she and Ben had those glorious voices. Ben thought I didn’t notice and perhaps I might not have said so as often as I should have, but I heard them and take comfort in those little things remembered, the things nearby.
There are photographers arriving soon to take my picture with Governor Oswald West while I sign the proclamation affirming Oregon’s women have the right to vote. He’s coming right here to my Clay Street home, and I’ll sign it on the library table where I’ve written so many of my books and speeches. I’ve a finely tanned hide from our Idaho ranch (Earl, my grandson, tanned it) to spread across the tabletop. Shirley and her precious Eloi are here too. And other suffrage leaders. Now I hope to live to actually vote in 1914, the first elections when we’ll be allowed. But even if I don’t, it will be a life well lived—for all my mistakes.
Our past president, Mr. Roosevelt, gave a speech about citizenship while we here in Oregon were fighting our fifth campaign for the vote, and I remember feeling the most defeated after that 1910 disaster. But I read the president’s speech, and he said something I cling to still. That the men to be celebrated are those in the arena, fighting the big battles even if they end in defeat. Well, he said “the man in the arena” is the one to be praised for being there, but I’m sure he would see the merit in putting women in that arena too. We too can fail deeply, but we fail by daring greatly. And that is how I hope to be remembered, that I dared greatly and so shall never be known as “those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
Oh, the governor’s here. The world is moving and women are moving with it. Isn’t that grand! Now where’s my best hat? I must look festive for the occasion that celebrates something truly worth doing.